


Thanksgiving

by cmk418



Category: Oz (TV)
Genre: Gen, Oz Wishing Well
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-05-25
Updated: 2008-05-25
Packaged: 2017-10-31 09:07:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,127
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/342317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cmk418/pseuds/cmk418
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tim has offered to do Thanksgiving for the staff this year.  Which means Sean is going to be doing Thanksgiving for the staff this year.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Thanksgiving

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place the Thanksgiving immediately after the series ends. I had Tim keep his job (for a change) and the pregnancy has mellowed Claire out a bit. That's all you need to know.
> 
> Written for Shivs & Shanks at OZ Wishing Well for the prompt - "Murphy/McManus - some kind of domestic scenes"

“When you said ‘Thanksgiving dinner at my place’, I thought ‘great, I won’t have to do anything but show up’,” Sean muttered as he jammed stuffing into the turkey.

“Could you keep it down?” whispered Tim, taking a sip of coffee.

Sean continued over him. “But then somebody had to get completely smashed last night – over what?”

Tim’s voice sounded weaker than usual. “I was worried that the turkey would be dry.” He leaned in to get a closer look at what Sean was doing. “You’re doing well. All those cavity searches paid off.”

“Fuck you.” Sean flung a bit of stuffing in Tim’s direction.

Tim ducked out of the way. “Hey! It’s six-thirty and I’m up with you. That has to count for something.”

“You’re drinking all the coffee.”

“You turned the oven on, right?”

“Cooking 101, Tim.”

“That was my second worry. We all come down with botulism or something.”

“I think it’s ptomaine. Botulism is pigs. Or is it salmonella.”

“That’s it. Salmonella is birds.”

“We shouldn’t have to worry. Hand me the butter.”

Tim blinked. “Huh?”

“For the turkey. And I thought I saw the…” Sean spied the salt and pepper shakers and grabbed them. The salt was caked at the top of the shaker, a victim of humidity, and a shake of the pepper garnered a few specks of black dust, but nothing more. “You can refill these every once in a while, you know. They’re not just conversation pieces.”

Tim fished some takeout packets of salt and pepper out of the cutlery drawer and handed them to Sean. “Here.”

“Thanks.” Sean slathered butter all over the turkey and then shook a generous helping of salt and pepper over the bird. “Did you say something?”

“No… I like watching you cook.”

Sean looked around the kitchen, recovered the aluminum foil from where it had fallen behind the microwave, and tented it over the top of the roasting pan. “Could you get the oven?”

Tim opened the oven door with a flourish and Sean maneuvered the bird inside.

“So it’s like that for four hours before we have to do anything more to it. What did you get for Pete?”

“Huh?”

“Remember she was telling us that her doctor had ordered her to go vegetarian.”

“Before Thanksgiving? That’s…”

“It’s been a couple months.”

“Oh. I thought she was just going through a salad phase.”

“You know, if you‘d come early to a staff meeting every once in a while, you’d pick up on things.”

“So Pete’s a vegan.”

“Vegetarian. She can still do eggs and dairy, just not meat.”

“Well, that makes things easier.”

“What are you going to serve, besides turkey? I looked in the fridge and I don’t think the six-pack of Coors qualifies as a side dish.”

“I’ve been meaning to get stuff, but…”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just let me sleep for two more hours and then we’ll hit the store.”

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

“I can’t believe this many people wait to the last minute.”

“You never did the Thanksgiving thing?”

“Once, when I was married. We had it catered.”

“I don’t remember that.”

“I figured you’d be with your family.”

“And…”

“Catered, Sean. It was embarrassing. Thanksgiving is supposed to be about home cooking.”

“And potlucks, let’s not forget those.”

“Potlucks? That’s why everybody kept asking if I wanted them to bring anything,” Tim sighed.

“C’mon. It’s not the end of the world. All first Thanksgivings are supposed to suck. I think it’s a law. Giving people something to laugh about for Thanksgivings to come is the tradition.”

“I don’t want to do this.”

Sean ignored him and began putting items into the cart. “So, I’m thinking easy. One of those salads in a bag, carrots, corn, potatoes.”

“Yams?”

“No.”

“But they’re traditional.”

“They won’t fit in your Barbie townhouse oven. We have to have things we can cook on the stovetop or not cook at all.”

“Okay. We can do cranberry sauce, right?”

“Absolutely.” Sean continued to load up the shopping cart. “Rolls. Pumpkin pie. Make that two pumpkin pies.”

“And we need to get chips and dip for the game.”

“Drinks too.”

“I have a six-pack of Coors in the fridge.”

Sean gave Tim a look. “Ice too.”

They wheeled the now-full cart up to the front of the store. The checkout lines were long.

“I wonder if we should-“ Tim began.

“No.”

“You don’t even know what I’m going to say.”

“You wanna go by the office. And even though it’s just a quick in and out, you’ll find seventeen things that need doing right away and I’ll be stuck in the car with the melting ice and soggy dinner rolls. So, no.”

Tim pouted. “You’re worse than Ellie sometimes, you know that.”

“That’s just because-“ Sean bit off the rest of his statement.

“What?”

“Nothing,” replied Sean, taking the items from the cart and putting them on the conveyor belt.

“She’s coming by the way. Ellie.”

“Oh. Good.”

“Since we were inviting everybody. I thought it might minimize the Claire Howell factor.”

“Too bad Querns couldn’t join us.”

“I’m gonna forget you said that. Are you sure we have enough food?”

“Yeah.”

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

“Dinner was spectacular, Tim. I never knew you could cook like this,” Eleanor gushed.

Sister Pete and Gloria exchanged knowing smiles across the table.

“I’m a man of hidden-“

From the kitchen, Claire spoke up, “You’re kidding, right? This is totally Mur-“

Sean slapped a hand over her mouth and whispered in her ear. “If you want any pumpkin pie at all, you won’t finish that statement.”

Claire nodded. “He’s clueless, you know.”

“Yeah,” whispered Sean.

“And you’re an idiot.” She smiled up at him then. “Thanks for inviting me. I can give you credit for that at least.”

“You’re welcome.”

“We need pie,” said Tim, coming into the kitchen. ”And coffee.”

Sean handed Tim a pumpkin pie and a knife. “Get that started. The coffee’s almost done. I’m making decaf.”

“I have decaf?”

“Slipped it in the cart when you weren’t looking.”

“Good thinking.”

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

An hour later, the guests were huddled around the television in the living room watching the Detroit-Dallas game.

“Who had Murphy in the pool?” Sister Pete asked.

“I thought for sure it would have been Claire,” Mukada said.

“I had Eleanor. No offense,” Gloria chimed in.

“None taken.”

Overhearing the conversation, Tim walked into the living room. “What’s wrong with Sean? He doesn’t have food poisoning or anything like that, does he?”

“Shh,” whispered Pete, gesturing to Sean’s sleeping form curled up in the easy chair.

Tim breathed a sigh of relief, then pulled a quilt from the back of the sofa and moved to cover Sean.

Watching the moment, Claire smiled to herself. Maybe McManus wasn’t so clueless after all.  



End file.
